Sights

I saw a whale yesterday. Andrew and I went up to deck 7 (the highest) to read and get some sun. Our marine biology professor was there, scanning the horizon with binoculars. After a few minutes, he turned to us and said "There's a whale!". It was pretty far away, but we could see it spouting and catch glimpses of its fins. It hung around for about five minutes, and then headed out, probably annoyed at the ship's noise. He guessed that it was a species I hadn't heard of...I'll have to ask him again.

The only other sea life I've seen so far is a flying fish, which was just as awesome as it sounds. It blasted out of the water, glided for several seconds a few inches above the surface, and then dove back down. Apparently they do that to escape predators, and to look badass.

Those two animals, along with a distant freighter and a fishing buoy, are the only things I've seen out here besides water. It's so empty, which is amazing because the visibility at our ships height is eight miles in each direction. It gave me a real sense of scale (the fact that there are are lot of ships in this ocean, but it's so huge that we hardly ever see them).

At 1200 every day, they distribute the Bridge Noon Report. Here's today's:

Bridge Noon Report
At noon today the Explorer’s position was…
Latitude: 33° 06 mins. N
Longitude: 027° 34 mins W
Distance made good: 2561 nautical miles
Distance to go to next port: 1162 nautical miles
Average speed: 15.68 kts
Air temp: 19° C (66° F)
Wind: NE/ 9 kts
Sunset today: 1816
Sunrise tomorrow: 0935

If you type "33° 06 mins. N , 027° 34 mins W" into maps.google.com , it should show you exactly where I am on the map. Let me know if that works, as there's no way to test it here.

Three more days 'till Cadiz, and four more until Barcelona!